By IANS/EFE,
Rio de Janeiro: In an effort to cope with the growing space crunch in the country’s jails, Brazil is considering release of undertrial prisoners and tracking them with electronic bracelets and ankle cuffs.
“Between 75,000 and 80,000 prisoners can serve their sentences while being tracked electronically,” the director of the National Penitentiary Department, Airton Michels, said in a statement published in the daily O Globo.
“Brazil already has very progressive legislation in terms of alternative sentences. The other option now is electronic tracking with the use of bracelets and ankle cuffs,” he said.
The 80,000 inmates, mainly those awaiting trial for various offences, constitute 17 percent of the total number of prisoners in the country.
Michels said keeping non-dangerous criminals out of prison is an alternative method for dealing with the problem of overcrowded jails.
The number of convicts in Brazil is increasing at the rate of 7.3 percent annually, while investment in building jails by state and municipal governments is minimal.
According to figures of the Penitentiary Department, in December Brazil had 473,626 inmates, 44 percent of them awaiting trial, and every year the deficit in the space available in prisons increases by 4,000.